I'm an avid SciFi reader. I picked up the bug around 11 or so, and haven't slowed down since. Well, not much. I need sleep nowdays more than then, but at my best I used to polish of 3 novels in a night (and run around half asleep the next day.

Current scifi has taken an odd turn, I believe it is called military scifi. It already had a venerable tradition, Heinlein's StarShip Troopers comes to mind (and don't prejudge the book from the movie, while one was loosely based on the other, it was only an approximation, and the novel did not mention the gore).

The current crop tends towards space opera, but that's OK with me. I like the Honor Harrington series myself, though I can see that not being everyone's cup of tea.

Another current title I would recommend is Von Neuman's War, where some really advanced Von Neuman machines start colonizing the solar system, and they really don't care if the planet's are occupied or not.

Read any you'd like to share?

 

If you like the over-the-top aspect of Mad Max, then Sean McMullen's books are fun. See if you can scare up "Souls in the Great Machine" to get started.

Larry Niven's "The Mote in God's Eye" is a great first contact novel.

Kim Stanley Robinson understands science and politics. Try the Mars Trilogy - "Red Mars", "Green Mars", and "Blue Mars".

You can't beat Niel Stephenson for alternate reality in "Anathem". Or Micheal Chabon's "The Yiddish Policeman's Union".

Don't like corporations? There is always Peter Watts and "Starfish".

 

I went to a used bookstore last Saturday, and thought I'd died and gone to Heaven.

There was Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, and Norton.

I also like S. M. Stirling's work -- Dies the Fire was good; the rest in the series were not as good, from my viewpoint. Also Peshawar Lancers was a good story.

John Ringo's Posleen War series was also pretty good. (A Hymn Before Battle, Gust Front, When the Devil Dances, & Hell's Faire are the main story. The side stories such as Watch on the Rhine and Yellow Eyes were OK. Sister Time and The Hero were not so hot, IMO)

I also picked up a couple of E.E. Smith's Lensman books.

And don't forget Burroughs' Martian Series! Good for buckling the swashes.

What's really interesting in reading the old books is when you ask, "Why didn't they use radar?" or "Why not plot the course with a computer?" and you realize these concepts did not exist at the time that those books were written!

In that vein, in one of E.E. Smith's books, there's a line like, "He was a pretty good computer..." which is jarring until you realize that "computer" meant "one who calculates" -- a mathematician.

--Rich

 

Read any you'd like to share?

Good topic Bill !

One I liked as a teenager was "The Gods Themselves" by Asimov. I mention this one because of all the talk we see on this site about free energy and global warming. This book takes both ideas; discovering unlimited energy and inadvertantly risking survival through the use of energy, to the limit.

 

I loved reading The Martian Chronicles and Fareheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. He's one of my favorite authors.

Austin

 

I love anything by Phillip K. Dick, Asimov, William Gibson...

and of course Burroughs is a fun trip to take sometimes but he wasn't really sci-fi, but maybe more psy-fi lol

But to be honest I haven't red much of anything fiction-wise since high school (mid-90s).

 

Good topic Bill !

Oh, and need I mention the one where my quote comes from? It's from Asimov's "Foundation", the first book in the famous Foundation Trilogy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundation_Trilogy

 

The big three when I was growing up was Clark, Heinlein, and Asimov. They are the standards by which I judge all others.

I'm really enjoying the "Through the Looking Glass" series currently. A physics professor in Florida generates a Boson particle, creating a nuclear sized explosion and generating a bunch of star gates. One of the things on the other side are Dreem, an advanced interstellar race that eats everything, and uses biology as it's technology (with great effect). Fresh meat, anyone? This series reminds me strongly of the Lensman series, and is good fun. The 3rd book just came out, "Claws that catch".

I like the Polseen series too.

 

I think John Ringo has a series a bit like that. The book covers are as lurid as anything that appeared on Thrilling Wonder Stories.

The guy who came up with the really wild cover art was Frank R. Paul - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_R._Paul

 

That is another difference, we're seeing more collaborations.

BTW, I misstated the title, "Into the Looking Glass", by John Ringo and Travis S. Taylor. Travis has written several good ones lately, including the "Von Neuman's War" I mentioned earlier.